Discussion: Plastic surgery for premades

[strangetomato]

I know that this tends to be a somewhat controversial topic for fans of premade sims, and I don't normally make adjustments to their faces (unless I had a good story reason for doing so, such as a character getting actual plastic surgery), but I'm considering making a couple of exceptions. Dora Ottomas is one of them.

I aged Dora back to adult for a project I'm working on and since I had her in Bodyshop, I thought I'd examine her wonky facial structure in more detail. I have no problem with Dora's "ugly" as such, but I do have a problem with the way her face is way shorter than the dimensions of the rest of the templates and thus does not line up properly, she has a super long neck, etc. My one rule for sim creation is never to shift the face or the eyes up or down (the mouth and nose can move a little, within reason), as this results in a sim with features that will not play nice in any genetic combination with other faces. The Ottomas family is a perfect example of this, as are some of the other latter day EP sims.

(From left to right: unaltered Dora as an adult, altered adult Dora, and Face Two)

The middle Dora is the one I've been working on, with her original face on the left and Face Two on the right for comparison.  I've shifted the features up and down until they line up roughly with Face Two (and thus all of the templates, with maybe the exception of shorter Face One). I also made some minor changes to the shape of her features, including minor adjustments to the eye depth (in an attempt to fix that deep shadow and the way the brow crashes through her eyes), and a slight softening of her jawline. I think her face makes more sense like this, but she still looks like Dora. What do you think? I was hoping to make it so she could correctly wear eye makeup without it getting all distorted, but somehow that still doesn't work. I'm not sure what they did to her eyes to prevent that, but they did a pretty thorough job of it.

I've considered a similar shift for an adult Faith Goodie, moving her face down a couple of notches to match Face One. She's another premade sim with a shorter than normal face. You can barely notice the change, but she doesn't have the swan neck or the lack of forehead.

What are your thoughts on sim surgery? Do you consider these sorts of adjustments acceptable? Feel free to share your thoughts below, but please keep your discussion with each other respectful. I know many simmers can get pretty passionate about this issue, so let's be mindful of that.

Comments

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I still think it resembles her, but depending on who's looking, I'm sure the changes would be noticeable. In the end, I've decided not to change her, but I wish the designer of those sims had realized the problems with shifting the face.

Have you ever played until the twins are born or Samantha and Peter have additional children? Some of those faces end up pretty broken.

Yeah, Chester and Loki both have very intense brows, but they line up fine with other features, so it doesn't bother me. I think Malcolm Landgraab also has the shortened face issue happening. His children often have odd bags under their eyes, most likely because his eyes are too high.

Thanks. :) That's reasuring, though I do like to consider these things, which is why I'm doing my thinking out loud here. But if I had to worry and second guess everything I do because someone might react badly to it (and someone invariably will), I'd never do anything.

[strange-tomato.livejournal.com]

An expert has appeared! :D Wait... can I see your badge? Haha.

I'm glad she passed your judgement, though in the end I won't be changing her. I know it's not something I'd want for most other sims, so broken or not, I've decided to go with it. I'm still bothered by the brokenness, but oh well.

Oh, changes to a sim's skintone are the worst. That's a whole other can of worms to open, isn't it? Not good. Similarly, I don't like when people give Ophelia dark hair. Sure it might be more realistic that way in our world (though not impossible), but sims can have any skintone and hair combo at all. It's not that uncommon of a look for a sim.

That is so weird about Dora being genetically Peter and Samantha's child. My guess is that they had the intention of using that same trick I always use for creating sim parents from the child's genetics and someone else's with the pacifier tool, but then maybe they were too lazy to make another sim to use for that so they just used Samantha. At least I prefer to think they were lazy instead of unaware of how that doesn't make any sense.

That's also interesting about the kids being spared the shortened face problems from Peter (I'd have guessed he was to blame). Nice to know. The unborn twins and any future kids are the ones who run the risk of having issues, and often do seem to be quite wonky. And Dora usually isn't an issue for breeding, being an elder female.

I used to think Dora WAS Sam's mother. Which made them hitting on each other autonomously at a community lot seem even more disturbing. (Though hitting on your mother in law is just... yeah.)

You may have gathered from my Tumblr post (if you saw it) that Dora will be a background character working at a childcare centre for the Willow and Lyla short story I'm working on. I'll explain more about it in a post pretty soon.

[meetme2theriver.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure I gave Buzz a red recessive from a parent, so Buck is blonde/red. I've done this for everyone, as far as I know. :) Including Peter, yes. Dora has light blue eyes too, and possibly blond hair as well, I can't remember. So I gave Peter recessive light blue eyes and blond hair, and now all their future kids won't have brown hair and eyes.

Luckily there's no families where the kid has a dominant hair or eye colour while both the parents have recessives, at least no living sims. There was some of that going on with some of the dead sims, but I just fixed the dead sims up a bit in that case. People are unlikely to resurrect them, anyway. In my fixed dead 'hoods, though, I made sure they all make sense, as far as possible.

I'd be very surprised if everyone was 100% satisfied with all of the changes I made/didn't make! But yeah, I'm glad so many people have gotten use out of them, makes it worth alllllll those hours in SimPE. :) Although I really did make them for myself in the first place!

[meetme2theriver.livejournal.com]

*flashes Ottomas Expert badge*

I am kind of glad you won't change her, I admit. I'd never change any of them in my own game, I love their broken genes, but I fully understand why others might not feel the same. :P

I think it's hard to recognize Ophelia when she's got dark hair. Same when people give the Caliente sisters dark hair. It's just not... them anymore. Sims are sims, and can look different from humans, after all.

Who knows what EAxis was thinking with Dora? Maybe they got her as a result from Peter and Sam, and thought she looked too freaky as a child, but that she might be good as an old lady? *shrugs* They make some very weird choices sometimes.

Haha, maybe Dora IS Samantha's mother as well... and then you could explain away the broken genetics as inbreeding! :P

I'm looking forward to seeing your short story! :) Toddler Tank, Ripp and Phi are so cute. <3

[so-goshable.livejournal.com]

Some of my favorite sims have been townies that I've put under the knife. Usually I just do minor asjustments, but if the change is extensive and I plan to use them ongoingly, I rename them.